[170] Another political sarcasm of the Tory poet, unauthorized by his original.
[171] An "infernal fury," according to the best readings of Chaucer, though others, which Dryden probably followed, have "fire."
[172] Folio Edit. Not.
[173] This sort of expostulation is common to many barbarous nations, and is said to be retained by the native Irish.
[174] The French launde, means a wild, uncultivated meadow, or glade. The word lawn, which we have formed from it, has a more limited signification.
[175] Derrick's Edit. their.
[176] Partlet, or Perthelot, as the proper name of a hen, is a word of difficult and dubious etymology. Ruddiman, in his Glossary to Douglas's Virgil, gives several derivations; the most plausible is that which brings it from Partlet, an old word signifying a woman's ruff.
[177] Among the distiches ascribed to Cato, we do in fact find one to that purpose:—
Somnia ne cures.—Lib. ii. distich 32.
[178] Cicero, who tells both the following stories in his treatise, De Divinatione, lib. i. cap. 27. Chaucer has reversed their order, and added many picturesque circumstances.